Ruined Childhood Dreams

As a poor kid growing up in poverty (or Georgia as it is called by some) I would look at car magazines like they were porn, dreaming about driving an Italian supercar. In these fantasies wheels would be screeching, tires would be smoking, gears would be shifting, autumn leaves would be displaced in the twin whirlwind of my passage into the sunset, and invariably a middle finger was hoisted high at all the other people who had a better car than I did. Which was anybody with a car at all, even a Dodge.

Most people would rather have a Ferrari but I was always drawn to the pissed off, futuristic designs of Lamborghinis. The Countach had become a bit dated by the time the Diablo came out, but once it did no car could compare in my adolescent gearhead wet daydreams. The Diablo was the car I wanted to go to the prom in. It was the car I wanted to drive to work in every day (at Wendy’s of course). It was the car I always wanted but would never be able to afford unless I really, REALLY stepped up my pimping game. This vehicle had remained just an idea in my head. A dream. I’d never even seen one before. Not once in all the races, car shows and air shows I had been to had anybody ever brought a Diablo. I have seen just about everything else, but not one of these.

Still, the dream never died.

Until the other day.

A friend of mine slash regular who has a penchant for ridiculously expensive toys had told me he would bring his newly acquired Diablo by The Sushi Joint so I could see it. After I was told that my friend was there I came out of the BOH and saw him by the host stand. I saw a long silver rocket through the window and remembered that NASA didn’t have any space missions that planned to stop off in my town, so I figured this was the day I would finally get a little closer to my dream.

I would get to SEE a Diablo up close with my own eyes!

I would get to TOUCH a Diablo with my unclean, poor person hands!

I would get to HEAR the engine fire up!

And, depending on whether or not he left the keys in it, I would get to DRIVE a Diablo in a legendary multi-state police chase that would rival anything you would see in GTA! I couldn’t wait!

All these thoughts raced through my head as I raced out the door. I told the hostess not to seat me, said ‘excuse me’ to the incoming customers I had knocked down on my way out the door, and arrived finally at the object of my car lust.

And it was everything all the pictures had led me to believe it would be. Beautiful lines, classic design, superior craftsmanship, ferocious engine–it was, like Jessica Alba, just magnificent to behold. I could feel my insides stirring, but not in a poopy kind of way. I was intoxicated by being so close to something that I had fantasized about so much.

I sat down in the driver’s seat. Or at least my ass did. Or most of my ass. When I tried to squeeze my legs in I realized a fatal flaw in the Diablo’s design: only normal sized people with no legs or else really tiny people could ever fit in one of these things. Even if I consulted a yoga master and 47 pages of text from the Kama Sutra I would never be able to bend my legs in such a way that I could fit in it. Wealthy Italians must be some tiny motherfuckers.

I was sad. My dream had died just like that. However, my Lamboner didn’t die for quite some time afterward. I had to go back in and talk to tables with that thing poking out. One of them even asked me ‘Hey do you need to take care of that or something?’

Still, it was a cool car.

 

Dignity and Respect

Me, The JerBear